Smile Hotel Nagoya Shinkansenguchi

The room was tiny, and the heat didn't work properly. Breakfast was average at best. It could do for one night in transit, but I wouldn't recommend it for a longer stay.

The hotel is near a Lawson, though it takes about a 10-minute walk to reach Nagoya station, which is a bit of a trek with luggage. My son and I had two single beds, but the room was so small we had to open our suitcases one at a time. The lighting was dim and yellowish, which I didn't like. There were only a few basic amenities, with little variety, and no bottled drinking water in the room, though tap water was available. Breakfast came in two choices, a Japanese set or an American set.

The room was noisy and smelled awful. It's non-smoking now, but the plastic's color made it look like people had smoked there before, and the nicotine seemed baked in. Some odd minty smell was supposed to cover it, but made things worse. The place needs a full redo to be worth staying in. There are lots of hotels around here, so I'd pick another. (Photo of the comically tiny attempt at decoration...)

Nagoya station is about a 10-minute walk away, and the price is affordable. The staff were very nice, but we still had an uncomfortable one-night stay. The room was small, especially the bed, and I'm not sure a Western couple could share that tiny queen bed. It was clean, but the old facilities could use a refresh. The air con didn't work for us, so we had to open the window even though it was pretty cold outside. One light was dead, leaving the room quite dark, and the toilet seat wasn't heated, so sitting on it felt cold.